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The Crisis

So The Elections that have been occuring in the Ivory Coast have filled every newspaper in the world, and every search engines on every website. How did Ivory Coast end up with two presidents? and why is the international commitee sanctioning Gbagbo? Many things the media are putting out there, are false. I was able to access the site of my country's website to find out what was happening, and I also called many of my family members there too. . It is a long story, but it is worth telling the truth right? Just in case you know this is the translated and shortened version of what happened.

It all started last year, to be exact when it was finally decided that there would be elections. There had not been elections in my country since 2000, and now people wanted to reform the government. So there were fourteen candidates and they were getting geared up, and getting ready to make those long speeches, about helping Ivory Coast's future, creating jobs, all the things politicians say. And of course, out of the fourteen, there were the big three; three :Gbagbo, Ouattara, and Bédié. Ok so, October 31st came rolling in and Alassane and Gbagbo passed to the next round. Gbagbo had 38.4% and Alassane had 32.07%, and both of them campaigned harder than ever, and on November 21st, the second round was held. The results were supposed to be out on November 22nd, but we waited for eight days for the Independant Electoral Commission (CEI) to anounce the results, and when they were finally able to, 2 men from Gbagbo's side; literally in front of the national television gabbed the results out of Bamba Yacouba (the represenatative of the CEI and announcer o the results) hands; and proclaimed, " These results are false, they have not been consolidated!". However Bamba Yacouba kept saying , "No these results are true." It was too late and the men tore up the results. So no results were said that day, and the next day the technicians of the national TV RTI (Radiodiffusion of Ivorian Television) took apart everything, and the journalists were asked to leave the scene. No one understood anything. Alassane, on a press conference asked for the immediate results of the election, and he got it ....a few days later. On Thursday, The CEI announced that Alassane had won the elections, and so you can imagine seeing the smile on that man's face who years back could not even become candidate because of the supposedly fact that he was not, " ivorian". However the Constitutional Court said there was fraud and that they would review the elections. While they were reviewing the elections, The Constitutional Court decided to cancel 9 northern cities of the country saying that there was "fraud" there. So on Friday the Court announced that Gbagbo was the president of the Ivory Coast. So can you imagine how much confusion there was? and to add even more to the confusion, the UN says it would review the court's decision, and guess what happened? the UN representative Mr. Choi said that the CEI's results were true, and so Alassane is the true president.In fact Obama, Sarkozy , and the European Union all congratulated Alassane on his victory, and told Gbagbo to step down. I forgot to add something important I think that you should keep in mind ; the President of the Court, Paul Yoa N' dre is really close to Gbagbo. I just think you should keep that in mind, while making judgements. This whole scrutiny caused chaos and confusion in the Ivory Coast, and it would in any country especially when you learn that your country has two presidents. So on saturday , Gbagbo decide to show the world that he was the president, by having his inauguration, and guess what Alassane was doing? he was also having his own inauguration with his party memebrs.

President Obama, The European Union, and President Sarkozy alll decided to sanction Gbagbo repeatedly. However whether the sanctions are just or not, the problem is that we have two presidents and the economy is worsening, becasue who are our cocoa exporters going to listen to? Who should the people take orders from? it is a mess, and even the African Union Commission (UA) sent their representative to tell Gbagbo to leave. The International Communuity is pressuring Gbagbo to leave and Gbagbo is trying to hold on, but will he last?

So now I am just tuned in to what is happening, and I pray that this issue gets resolved.